Travel

07/27/2013

Two Polish nuns laugh on the shore as hundreds of thousands of young Catholic pilgrims attending World Youth Day (WYD) start gathering at Copacabana Beach in Rio de Janeiro for a prayer vigil with Pope Francis, on July 27, 2013. In a speech to Brazil's political, religious and civil society leaders earlier, Pope Francis said a "constructive dialogue" was needed to confront the country's social turmoil, referring to the massive street protests that rocked Brazil last month to demand an end to corruption and better public services.

07/26/2013

A dancer in Mongolia costumes performs in Xiangshawan Desert, also called Sounding Sand Desert on July 19, 2013 in Ordos of Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, China. Xiangshawan is China's famous tourist resort in the desert. It is located along the middle section of Kubuqi Desert on the south tip of Dalate League under Ordos City. Sliding down from the 110-metre-high, 45-degree sand hill, running a course of 200 metres, the sands produce the sound of automobile engines, a natural phenomenon that nobody can explain. (Photo by Feng Li/Getty Images)

07/24/2013

National Geographic has offered a strikingly visual, yellow-bordered window into the rest of the world for 125 years — and to celebrate the anniversary, they are auctioning off 125 images from their archives through the Christie's site, from July 19-29. Here are 15 images from "Boundless: 125 Years of National Geographic Photography."

05/08/2013

Orania is a South Africa's only "purely" white town founded in the Northern Cape province in 1991 by Afrikaners, for Afrikaners opposed to the post-apartheid "rainbow nation," just after the release of Nelson Mandela. One thousand people live in Orania, and they try to be as self-sufficient as possible. They have their own money, as well as their own flag. Orania's population grows at nine per cent a year. It attracts Afrikaners who feel to be left out in the new South Africa, and who are scared of the country's high crime rates. The little town is protected by article 235 of South Africa's constitution, which guarantees the right of self-determination. But residents here are thinking big — their next goal is the creation of an Afrikaner Republic.

Photos taken by Stephane de Sakutin of AFP/Getty Images on April 17, 2013.

A young boy plays by a painted wall reading
"Welcome in Orania" in Afrikaans.

04/24/2013

The winners have been announced for the 25th annual National Geographic Traveler photo contest — featuring some stunning pictures of people, places and things from around the globe. They're still taking submissions, for all you globe-trotting photographers. Here is a selection of our favourites that have already been entered:

A fisherman casts his net on Bira Beach in Indonesia. Dody Kusuma photo

Mikael Ande, a child of Sami reindeer herders, takes a break indoors after a long, cold day of rounding up the animals for vaccinations and slaughter. Children of reindeer herders learn to handle these animals and the land they thrive in from infancy — young Mikael here knew far more about the ways of nature than I could ever hope to learn. Michelle Schantz photo

I found this girl in a monastery in Jakar, posing at the door of the main entrance to the chapel. Juan Abal Lopez photo

A scientist climbs out of an ice cave formed by volcanic vents near the summit of Mt. Erebus, Antarctica. Alasdair Turner photo

04/03/2013

Nigeria reopened its train line to the north in December of 2012, marking the end of
a $166 million project to rebuild portions of the abandoned line that had been washed
out years earlier. The state-owned China Civil Engineering Construction
Corp. rebuilt the southern portion of the line, while a Nigerian
company handled the rest.

The rebirth of the line that goes north, called the Ooni of Ife, constitutes a major economic relief to the
poor seeking to travel in a country where most earn less than $1 a day.
Airline tickets remain out of the reach of many and journeys over the
nation's crumbling road network can be dangerous. The cheapest train
ticket available costs only $13.

The Ooni of Ife is a gruelling trip that travels 835 kilometres from Lagos, Nigeria's massive southwestern city, on the long trip north to Kano. The route offers a glimpse of the nation's history and landscapes, while also allowing travelers to see its ethnic and religious diversity firsthand. While Nigeria is predominantly divided into a Christian south and a Muslim north, the two faiths live together largely peacefully and intermarry in sprawling Lagos. All of Nigeria's more than 250 ethnic groups can be found on the city's busy streets, hustling out a living otherwise not possible in their home regions.

Photos taken in March 2013 by Sunday Alamba of The Associated Press.

Passengers lineup to purchase train tickets to Kano, in a terminal in Lagos, Nigeria.

03/26/2013

Amateur shipbuilder Alexander Marchenko has constructed a
traditional 17th century-style wooden sailing ship, moored to a bank of
the Yenisei River in the Siberian Taiga area in Khakassia region some
520 km south of Krasnoyarsk, Russia. Marchenko,
who has no experience in building or operating sail boats, has spent his free
time on the ship for the last two years, working to achieve his childhood dreams of
building a boat. He plans to use the vessel as a Yenisei River tourist
attraction, moored between the Sayano-Shushenskaya and the Maynskaya
hydroelectric power stations. Marchenko was photographed on March 24, 2013, by Reuters photographer Ilya Naymushin.

02/18/2013

The coldest temperatures in the northern hemisphere have been recorded in the Oymyakon valley, Republic of Sakha, northeast Russia, where according to the United Kingdom Met Office, a temperature of -67.8 degrees Celsius (-90 degrees Fahrenheit) was registered in 1933 - the coldest on record in the northern hemisphere since the beginning of the 20th century. Yet despite the harsh climate, people live in the valley, and the area is equipped with schools, a post office, a bank, and even an airport runway (albeit open only in the summer).

Here's a glimpse into the lives of the people who inhabit this harsh region of Russia.

REUTERS/Maxim Shemetov

A minibus drives along an ice road across the Lena river, outside Yakutsk in the Republic of Sakha, northeast Russia.

REUTERS/Maxim Shemetov

A girl bundled up for the cold in the village of Oymyakon, in the Republic of Sakha, northeast Russia.

REUTERS/Maxim Shemetov

A man passes a sign saying "Oymyakon 'Pole of Cold'" on the site of a former meteorological station in the village of Oymyakon, in the Republic of Sakha, northeast Russia.

REUTERS/Maxim Shemetov

Lumberjacks Alexey Egorov, 45, (L) and Semion VInokurov, 53, lunch in the cabin of their truck in forest outside Tomtor in the Oymyakon valley, in the Republic of Sakha, northeast Russia.

REUTERS/Maxim Shemetov

A general view of the village of Tomtor in the Oymyakon valley, in the Republic of Sakha, northeast Russia.

REUTERS/Maxim Shemetov

Ships are moored on the banks of a river for the winter outside Yakutsk in the Republic of Sakha, northeast Russia.

REUTERS/Maxim Shemetov

A view shows ice sculptures on the Lena river, constructed for the celebration of Orthodox Epiphany outside Yakutsk in the Republic of Sakha, northeast Russia.

REUTERS/Maxim Shemetov

Alexander Gubin, 43, prepares to dive into the frozen Labynkyr lake, some 100 km south from Oymyakon in the Republic of Sakha, northeast Russia.

05/18/2012

This seems like a fitting shot to kick off a long weekend — bumper-to-bumper Toronto traffic on the 404 headed northbound to cottage country:

Highway 404 traffic is seen going northbound (towards the camera) out of the GTA at Steeles Avenue on the afternoon of Friday, May 18, 2012 — the exodus of Torontonians heading out of the city for the Victoria Day long weekend. (DAVID COOPER/TORONTO STAR)